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Jul 27 Student faces expulsion for beliefs about homosexuality

From Fox News.
A graduate student in Georgia (USA) is suing her university after she was told she must undergo a remediation program due to her beliefs on homosexuality and transgendered persons.

The student, Jennifer Keeton, 24, has been pursuing a master's degree in school counseling at Augusta State University since 2009, but school officials have informed her that she'll be dismissed from the program unless she alters her "central religious beliefs on human nature and conduct," according to a civil complaint filed last week.

"[Augusta State University] faculty have promised to expel Miss Keeton from the graduate Counselor Education Program not because of poor academic showing or demonstrated deficiencies in clinical performance, but simply because she has communicated both inside and outside the classroom that she holds to Christian ethical convictions on matters of human sexuality and gender identity," the 43-page lawsuit reads.

Keeton, according to the lawsuit, was informed by school officials in late May that she would be asked to take part in a remediation plan due to faculty concerns regarding her beliefs pertaining to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues.

"The faculty identifies Miss Keeton's views as indicative of her improper professional disposition to persons of such populations," the lawsuit reads.

The remediation plan, according to the lawsuit, noted Keeton's "disagreement in several class discussions and in written assignments with the gay and lesbian 'lifestyle,'" as well as Keeton's belief that those "lifestyles" are cases of identity confusion.

If Keeton fails to complete the plan, including additional reading and the writing of papers describing the impact on her beliefs, she will be expelled from the Counselor Education Program
, the lawsuit claims.

Keeton has stated that she believes sexual behavior is the "result of accountable personal choice rather than an inevitability deriving from deterministic forces," according to the suit.

"She also has affirmed binary male-female gender, with one or the other being fixed in each person at their creation, and not a social construct or individual choice subject to alteration by the person so created," the lawsuit reads. "Further, she has expressed her view that homosexuality is a 'lifestyle,' not a 'state of being.'"

In a statement to FoxNews.com, Augusta State University officials declined to comment specifically on the litigation, but said the university does not discriminate on the basis of students' moral, religious, political or personal views or beliefs.
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